Many types of adhesives are used to adhere surface covering material to such surfaces as floors, walls, counter tops or the like. The type of adhesive used depends upon the nature of the surface covering material, the surface being covered and the conditions to which the surface covering will be subjected. Surface coverings of the type formed from a polyvinyl halide layer, with or without a felt backing layer such as cellulose or asbestos fibers, are often applied to wood or masonite using the adhesive disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,036,673 issued July 19, 1977 to R. Murphy et al, which is a foamed latex adhesive. Although this adhesive is satisfactory on a variety of surfaces, it fails to adhere to damp concrete. Latex adhesives in general dry extremely slowly on asbestos felt backed surface coverings when laid on even slightly damp concrete, and these adhesives may not dry at all on impervious backings under these conditions. During the 1950's, a two-part latex hydraulic cement was used as an adhesive for rubber tile. This adhesive is suitable for use on damp concrete as it dries by reaction of the hydraulic cement with water, but it fails when used with plasticized vinyl surface coverings due to migration of plasticizer softening the adhesive. Two part epoxy adhesives are available, but they are expensive, inconvenient, and have limited adhesion to plasticized vinyl compounds, and urethane adhesives are difficult to handle and expensive.
It is therefore a primary object of this invention to provide an inexpensive one-part adhesive to adhere impervious and felt backed vinyl sheet material to damp concrete.